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Tackling undeclared work database

Undeclared work can be defined as work which is in itself legal but is not declared to the authorities for tax, social security and/or labour law purposes. Across the 28 Member States of the European Union, a great deal of effort is being invested into developing and testing policy measures that aim to tackle undeclared work.

In 2008, Norway’s central social partners, the Ministry of Finance and the Tax Administration renegotiated an agreement obliging them to further develop their joint cooperation against the black economy. The alliance primarily engages in awareness-raising activities and provides companies, entrepreneurs, workers and consumers with information on the societal consequences of undeclared work and guidelines on how to follow tax rules through their websites, as well as popular educational programmes directed at young people.

Different public regulatory bodies have for a number of years carried out coordinated efforts against social dumping and undeclared work (Samordnede tiltak mot svart arbeid). In carrying out these inspections, the tax authorities, the Labour Inspection Authority and the police have worked together. In recent years, the construction sector has been targeted, among others, due to considerable problems witnessed in connection with the influx of foreign companies and employees in the sector.

‘Clean development’ (Ren Utvikling) is a certification scheme and an industry development programme for companies in the Norwegian cleaning industry. An important feature of the initiative is its emphasis on developing industry practices that are less prone to undeclared work. All of the participating industrial cleaning companies are obliged to provide documentation that their accounts and tax records are in order.

In order to improve the level of decent work practices and to lower the rate of undeclared work, the Norwegian government has made it compulsory for employers in the construction industry to supply their employees with identity (ID) cards. In order to obtain an ID card, both the employer and employees have to be registered in different mandatory registers, including the tax register.